The History of Little Fanny – Make Your Own Paper Dolls

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This gallery contains 19 photos.

The History of Little Fanny, Exemplified in a Series of Figures was offered in 1810 by the publisher S. and J. Fuller at their magnificent Temple of Fancy, a London emporium of artists’ supplies, instruction books on drawing and painting, … Continue reading

Happy Holidays!

New Year shown as a fashionable young man, beofre a depiction of the zodiac

In January 1823 the London Magazine published Charles Lamb‘s humorous three-page essay “Rejoicing Upon the New Year’s Coming of Age.” It imagined the feast given by the New Year, and attended by 365 guests: April’s Fool, May Day, Christmas, Lord Mayor’s Day, and all the rest. By 1824, Lamb had recast his work as a poem for children, and it was printed with six pages of engravings as The New Year’s Feast on His Coming of Age. In honor of the holidays, we are sharing the copy that come to the Library as part of the Ellery Yale Wood Collection of Children’s Books and Young Adult Literature. It begins:

The Old Year being dead, the young Lord, New Year’s Day,
Determined on giving, for once and away,
A treat to his friends; and that none might be slighted,
All the days in the year to the Feast were invited.

After some squabbling about whether the sad, depressing fast days should be included, Christmas Day prevails and they are invited. It turns out Christmas is not just being kind – he intends to get Ash Wednesday drunk and see what happens.

Twelfth Day (usually called Twelfth Night) is the epitome of style, and May Day and St. Valentine cozy up on a sofa.

New Year’s speech of welcome is rudely interrupted by November 5 (the anniversary of the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, Bonfire Day), and the guests take it upon themselves to kick the malcontent out into the street.

April Fool, who appears in many of these engravings, serves as chief jester and master of ceremonies for the feast. He seats the distant solstices together at the table:

The twenty-first day of June, I remember,
He sat next the twenty-first day of December;
The former the latter contemptuously eyed,
Like a May-pole a[nd] marrow-bone placed side by side.

Fortunately for the modern reader, an appendix is provided “designed to assist the juvenile capacity in understanding the allusions in the Poem.” These notes explain, for example, why August the Twelfth and St. George’s Day quarrel over who is to propose the King’s health – George IV’s birthday had come to be celebrated not on his natal day, but on St. George’s feast day, April 23. Other notes are equally useful, explaining Quarter Days, Ember Days, Rogation Day, Septuagesima, and the Greek Kalends (which turn out not to exist).

Once Christmas has plied Ash Wednesday with wassail, both entertain the company with song.

Music and conversation follow, and after further revels, the guests depart for their homes. Watchmen (the Vigils) accompany those who needed assistance.

Another old Vigil, a stout-made patrol.
Called the Eve of St. Christopher’s, jolly old soul,
Perceiving Ash Wednesday inclining to roam,
Took him up on his shoulders and carried him home.

You can read the book for yourself (and find out what Christmas and Ash Wednesday sang, and who went scandalously home with whom) on the Internet Archive. We have digitized our handsome, hand-colored copy, and loaded it into this vast public library at https://archive.org/details/NewYearsFeastOnHisComingOfAge1824. The original essay is also available at https://archive.org/details/londonmagazine11taylgoog/page/n16.

We wish you and yours the happiest of holidays and a very happy, healthy new year!

National Library of Korea publishes catalogue of Bryn Mawr’s Korean books

Illustration from the Shurangama Sutra

Illustration from the Shurangama Sutra, printed in 1547

The National Library of Korea recently published an illustrated catalogue of the 42 Korean books held in the Special Collections Department of the Bryn Mawr College Library.  The catalogue, The Helen Chapin Korean Book Collection in the Bryn Mawr College Library (Seoul: National Library of Korea, 2017), consists of notes and illustrations for each book.   Even though the collection is a small one, it includes numerous important early Korean printed books, including a 16th century Buddhist text and a significant number of 17th, 18th, and early 19th century books.

The work was edited by Hye-Eun Lee, Professor in the Department of Library and Information Science at Sookmyung Women’s University and Jihee Han, Curator of the National Library of Korea, based on their work with the collection at Bryn Mawr College in 2011.  Also included is an essay on the collection and its collector, Helen Burwell Chapin, Bryn Mawr College class of 1915, by Eric Pumroy, Seymour Adelman Director of Special Collections at the Bryn Mawr College Library.   The catalogue is primarily in Korean.

Photo of Chapin with her bicycle in China, ca.1930

Helen Chapin in China, ca.1930

Helen Chapin donated the collection to Bryn Mawr in 1950, shortly before her death, along with many other books, scrolls, and artifacts from Korea, China and Japan that she collected during her years of working in those countries as an independent scholar, beginning in the 1920s.   She collected most of the Korean books after World War II when she worked for the United States Army in Korea surveying cultural monuments.

Among the highlights of the collection, as noted by Curator Jihee Han, are the Shurangama Sutra, a Buddhist text published in 1547, and a collection of literary texts published at the military camp at Hunryondogam in 1610 using wooden movable type.  The catalogue can be viewed online in Scholarship, Research and Creative Work at Bryn Mawr College: https://repository.brynmawr.edu/bmc_books/35/

Eclipses! – from the Ellery Yale Wood Collection of Children’s Books and Young Adult Literature

I Have been very anxious about the Weather To-day, how it might chance to fall out, on Account of the Eclipse of the Sun that is to be this afternoon; but it is at present fine, and I hope the Clouds will forbear, and permit us the extraordinary Sight…

Diagram of solar and lunar eclipses from The Young Gentleman and Lady’s Philosophy

Thus begins the chapter on solar eclipses in The Young Gentleman and Lady’s Philosophy (second edition, London: 1772). The book is written in the form of  conversations between Cleonicus, home from College for the summer, and his sister, Euphrosyne, whose lively interest in the natural sciences (“philosophy”) is impeded by her lack of access to instruction on the topic. She has formed the plan of getting her brother to help her, and in a series of dialogues, Cleonicus introduces her to astronomy and physics, using sketches, models, and experiments. Although she frequently suggests that a new subject may be too difficult for her, her intelligence and his organized and factual instruction consistently produce firmly rooted understanding on which she builds. The work speaks strongly for women’s education, arguing that if they were given the opportunity to study the sciences, they could excel.

Euphrosyne and Cleonicus are fortunate to have the opportunity to observe a total solar eclipse together, and following an explanation of why eclipses occur, he sets up two viewing stations –  a telescope with darkened lenses* and an adjacent room which acts as a camera obscura – a pinhole projector on a large scale. Here are highlights of their conversation during a solar eclipse:

Euphros. But see, the Time is at Hand for the Eclipse to begin — It wants 5 1/2 Minutes by my Watch.

Cleon. Well, we are prepared for it, happen as soon as it will; I have fixed the Telescope in a proper Position for viewing it; and thereby you will see it in me Heavens. I have also darkened the Chamber, wherein you will see the Eclipse in Miniature very perfectly; and have so ordered it that you only need to step out of one Room into another to see both.

Euphros. Dear Cleonicus, I am greatly obliged to you; but let me seat myself at the Telescope to observe the Beginning.

Cleon. Do so immediately; there is a Piece of dark Glass before the Eye-Glass in the Telescope, through which you may view the Sun without hurting your Eyes.

Euphros. Very good, Cleonicus; let me view him — I see his glorious Face, and the several Spots which beautify it — there is yet no Appearance of an Eclipse.

Cleon. In half a Minute you’ll see it.

Euphros. I do: — The Moon just touches him on the right Side and covers a very small Part — let me see it in the Chamber —

Cleon. Look in.

Euphros. ‘Tis just as I saw it at large in the Telescope; how beautiful it appears in that small Picture! But here it begins on the left Side, how is that?

Cleon. That is, because the Image of the Sun is inverted by the single Glass in the Scioptric Ball — See, there is a large Spot, which the Moon will presently hide, — view it in the Telescope —

….

Euphros.  I never observed an Eclipse with so much Pleasure and Exactness before — But see, methinks it begins to appear somewhat darkish, or else ’tis my Fancy —

Cleon. The Sun is now about two thirds Eclipsed, and the Day-light begins to be sensibly diminished, and will be so in a few Minutes.

Euphros. ‘Tis darker than it was — I’ll view the Sun again —- he appears horned like the Moon in her last Quarter;

Cleon. The Darkness increases very sensibly — the Air seems obscured, you will quickly see the Stars —

Euphros. The Stars! Will it be so dark as to make them visible?

Cleon. Visible! Yes, for a considerable Time; you will see Day converted into Night

Euphros. Bless me, you make me shudder at the Thought.

Cleon. It will be much darker by- and by in about three or four Minutes the Sun will be totally eclipsed —

…………

Cleon. The Sun is now totally eclipsed.

Euphros. Look, see how the Beasts run under the Trees — what do the poor Creatures think!

Cleon. Think! They can’t tell what the Matter is, — they know ’tis something very extraordinary — There has been many a Night not so dark as it is now.

Euphros. That I am sure of — well ’tis very surprising —-

Cleon. So it is, to see the two great Lights of Heaven in a Manner both extinguished!

…….

Euphros. The Eclipse, I see, is nearly at an End; I do assure you, Cleonicus, I never spent 2 1/4 Hours with more Pleasure and agreeable Surprize than now. — If you please, we will now go to drink Tea, and then I shall trouble you with a few more Questions about an Eclipse of the Moon.

Cleon. With all my Heart, my Euphrosyne; you know nothing gives me a greater Pleasure than to satisfy your Enquiries about natural Things.

 

The brother and sister at the telescope.

The book is part of the Ellery Yale Wood Collection of Children’s Books and Young Adult Literature. To see the original pages: Eclipses_from_The_Young_Gentleman_and_Ladys_Philosophy_1772a.

*It is not safe to look through a telescope at a solar eclipse without specialized equipment. Please follow NASA’s recommendations for viewing at https://eclipse2017.nasa.gov/safety

Marianne Hansen, Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts

 

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A May Day Story – from The Ellery Yale Wood Collection of Books for Young Readers

In 1809 the publisher J. Aldis of London printed a little picture book that invited many famous literary characters to a May Day birthday party. The birthday girl was Goody Two Shoes, who first appeared in 1765, a virtuous, hardworking girl who rose from poverty to comfortable respectability. In this, later, work she took advantage of her wealth to give a ball. The guests included a recent star in the juvenile literature firmament: Old Mother Hubbard and her dog (from a nursery rhyme published in 1805). Dick Whittington (a real Lord Mayor of London in the fifteenth century whose wildly revised and inaccurate history was popular by the 1700’s) and his cat appear hand in hand with Little Red Riding Hood. A monkey in a fancy hat provides a slap at Napoleon, a hot topic during the Peninsular War. Pompey the Little, the canine subject of a roman a clef from 1751, offered acrobatic entertainment. Little Tommy Tucker (first published 1744), of course, sang for his supper. The feast and dancing commenced.

And a wonderful time was had by all!

Goody Two Shoe’s Birth Day, on the First Day of May. London: J. Aldis, No. 9 Pavement, Moorfields. March 1, 1809.

A scan of the entire book is available on the Internet Archive at https://archive.org/details/AHistoryOfGoodyTwoShoesBirthDay

Marianne Hansen, Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts

A Tale as Old as Time – from The Ellery Yale Wood Collection of Children’s Books and Young Adult Literature

The fairy tale Beauty and the Beast has received attention recently with Disney’s release of a live action version of the film. Like any adaptation, the film is not exactly the same as its predecessors. However, the differences between Disney’s animated and live action films are not as noticeable when compared to older versions of the story like the circa 1875 version pictured below. As further indication of Beauty and the Beast’s long history, even this version describes itself as “An Old Tale New-Told.”

Eleanor Vere Boyle’s illustrated book Beauty and the Beast not only recounts the well-known plot, but also includes elements that are reminiscent of other fairy tales. One of the most obvious is that in this version, Beauty has two sisters, and her attractiveness and sweet disposition are catalysts for their envy. The girls’ mother died, and though Beauty’s father loves her very much, for most of the story he is oblivious to the sisters’ animosity toward Beauty. Although there are an additional two brothers added to the mix, the general family dynamic resembles Cinderella’s experience.

Check out the illustrations below for more comparisons to other fairy tales and a unique depiction of the Beast!

This image shows Beauty as a young girl with “her new scarlet cloak, to wrap her friend the old watch dog in!” This action is included to demonstrate her good character. Her cloak reminded me of Little Red Riding Hood.

In this scene, Beauty’s father enters the Beast’s garden intending to take a white rose back for Beauty. Stealing a plant for a loved one (and facing consequences for doing so) calls to mind the story of Rapunzel. This image is the first glimpse the reader gets of the Beast.

Each night when they dine, the Beast asks Beauty to marry him. Though she resists, she is slowly falling in love with him.

When Beauty returns home to visit her family, we encounter this scene in which Beauty’s sisters weep because even in her exile, their sister has returned dressed more finely then they, courtesy of the Beast. The ravens later overhear the sisters plotting Beauty’s death. Although the birds are portrayed neither as good nor evil, I thought of a few Snow White movies that feature ravens alongside the villain like “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” (1937) and the more recent “Snow White and the Huntsman.”

After Beauty professes her love for him, the Beast is transformed back into his princely self. Like Tchaikovsky’s Sleeping Beauty ballet, the rest of the castle “wakes up” as well, including the Beast’s mother, the Queen.

Isabel Gellert, Class of 2019

Was ever life history written in more dainty hieroglyphics!

(WA Bentley, in Appleton’s Popular Science Monthly, 1898)

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Wilson Alwyn Bentley (February 7, 1865 – December 23, 1931) was a pioneering photographer of snowflakes (and other weather phenomena) and an innovative researcher into many branches of meteorology. Over the course of his lifetime, he successfully photographed more than 5000 individual snowflakes.

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Although Bentley worked alone, and was home-schooled and then self-taught, his photographs and research were recognized in his lifetime by fellow scientists. His first article was published in 1898 in Appleton’s Popular Scientific Monthly. He published frequently in Monthly Weather Review and his articles also appeared in Scientific American, National Geographic, Popular Mechanics ( see http://www.snowflakebentley.com/WBpopmech.htm for his article from 1922 on his photographic methods), and many general interest magazines.

122His magnum opus, Bentley, W. A., and W. J. Humphreys. Snow Crystals, New York, McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1931, was published shortly before his death. It includes more than 2000 photomicrographs, mostly snow crystals but also hail, frost, and dew.

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The library has a remarkable pair of albums of original photomicrographs, containing 400 of Bentley’s images of snow. These may be the photos used in Snow Crystals; UCLA has a similar album, with 200 photos, which they say are illustrations for the book. The albums were the gift of Helen F. Corson.

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We will be sharing individual photos on a nearly-daily schedule throughout the winter on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/Bryn-Mawr-College-Special-Collections-205274397222/). You can read more about Bentley and his work and publications at http://www.snowflakebentley.com/WBsfman.htm.

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Still deciding on the Thanksgiving menu?

turkeyRecently added to our collection of cookbooks, etiquette guides, and housekeeping manuals is a 1911 first edition of Fannie Merritt Farmer’s Catering for Special Occasions with Menus & Recipes (Philadelphia: David McKay). On pages enlivened by illustrations of a series of disturbingly carnivorous cherubs, Farmer suggested two menus for Thanksgiving. The selection of dishes included creamed corn and tomato soup topped with popcorn, oyster soup, celery with caviar, flaming sweet potatoes,  turnip croquettes, squash souffle, chicken pie (in addition to the turkey!), chiffonade-dressed lettuce,  cranberry sherbet, cream-cheese stuffed dates, vanilla ice cream, jelly roll, pumpkin pie, and mincemeat pie.

Feeling tempted to try something new? Here is the entire Thanksgiving chapter of the book – FannyFarmers1911Thanksgiving2

Bon appétit!

To Increase Your Delight – Sampling the Ellery Yale Wood Collection of Children’s Books and Young Adult Literature

Our first exhibition of the books in the Ellery Yale Wood collection opened today – To Increase Your Delight is showing in the Coombe Suite on the 2nd floor of Canaday Library through December, open during normal library hours. There was no shortage of wonderful books to show, and in fact the problem was the opposite one: how to begin to introduce a collection of something like 10,000 books in a very modest exhibition. I did, finally, choose twenty-two volumes to represent the whole – approximately two tenths of one percent of the books – and in spite of their number they give a taste of the riches we are still uncovering.

blogBFThe collection has hundreds of volumes of fairy tales and folk tales. We are showing a spectacular Sleeping Beauty (1876) illustrated by Walter Crane, an Ainu story (Ho-Limlim: A Rabbit Tale from Japan, 1990) illustrated by the modern woodcut artist Keizaburō Tejima, and an 1871 collection of fairy tales illustrated by Gustave Doré.blogCraneFantasy literature is very well represented in the collection from its beginnings in the nineteenth century right through The Hobbit, Harry Potter, and Philip Pullman’s work. The exhibition includes first editions of Mary Poppins (1934) and The Amber Spyglass (2000), and a beautifully illustrated French Alice in Wonderland from 1935.blogaliceOther young adult novels featured are The Sword in the Stone, by T.H. White,

blogSwordand Tennis Shoes, by Noel Streatfeild, (both 1938); Frances Hodgson Burnett’s first version of A Little Princess (1888); blogCreweRosemary’s Sutcliff’s The Armourer’s House (1951),  representing the important genre of historical novels; and one of the more than eighty novels written by Mrs Molesworth, a successful (although now little known) nineteenth-century author, The Trio in the Square (1898).

The collection includes many educational books, aimed at both the intellectual and the moral improvement of their young readers. We are showing Papa’s Gift for a Good Child (1850), blogPapaan ABC; an 1820 pamphlet on learning to read music; and the 1876 The Young Lady’s Book: A Manual of Amusements, Exercises, Studies, and Pursuits, with chapters on everything from cooking, sewing, and drawing to heraldry, stamp collecting, and archery. Attempts to make children better behaved are represented by Amy Catherine Walton’s religious novel Audrey, or, Children of Light (1897) blogAudrey and by The Daisy, or, Cautionary Stories in Verse: Adapted to the Ideas of Children from Four to Eight Years Old (1807). blogGiddySix Stories for the Nursery: In Words of One and Two Syllables crosses the mind/morals divide by trying to teach reading and manners simultaneously.

Nonsense verse is the last category we managed to fit in, with two early editions of Dame Trot and her Comical Cat (both between 1800 and 1810), and The New Butterfly’s Ball (1849), which begins:

From a sweet fairy grove, by the side of a pool,
Beneath a green willow, majestic and cool;
The Herald went forth, in most beautiful weather,
With trumpet, to summon the party together.
Saying “Little folks all,
Attend to my call,
The Butterfly gives an invite to a ball.
To increase your delight
She adds an invite
To an elegant supper, to finish the night.”

blogButterflyWe cannot offer you an elegant supper, but we do hope you will drop by to look at the books – and that you will be increasingly delighted.

– Marianne Hansen, Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts